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Chapter skype05

Curious about the entrepreneurial adventure behind inspiring brands, Brand and Strategic Professional Martijn Arets decided to quit his job, hand in his lease car, ignore all uncertainties and follow his dream. For five months, he travelled more than 15,000 kilometres across Europe in a one-of-a-kind 1971 Volkswagen T2 camper van, meeting with the founders, CEOs and brand managers of 20 authentic European brands in what was to prove a unique trip: Brand Expedition. On popular demand, he has bundled the lessons and stories behind 20 appealing European brands such as Lego, Mini, Skype, The Body Shop and Adidas to create Brand Expedition, the book.

More information? Check www.brand-expedition.com or send Martijn a Tweet: @martijnarets.

Chapter skype05

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BEFORE YOU START….please look into your camera and tellus slowly your name, city andcountry… Then you can start readingthis paragraph out loud… Have fun!

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“Every day, I am surprised by ournumbers. Especially if you realizethat we have only been around forseven years. This year we had a newrecord: 25 million users onlinesimultaneously.” As of March 2011,

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at peak times, approximately 30million concurrent users are loggedinto Skype at any given time. “DuringSkype’s early years, many telecom-providers feared Skype’s fast-growingpopularity. They had been sitting

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pretty for years and looked askance atSkype’s rapid growth. Luckily, thingshave changed, and we now worktogether with large telecom providerssuch as Verizon, from the U.S. Withthe imminent arrival of the new

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generation of smart phones, there isno future in making money on callminutes. Telecom providers would dobetter to focus on mobile data traffic,whereby it does not matter whetherthe content is speech, video, Internet

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or e-mail. The provision of services toconsumers has once again becomewhat it is all about.”